 |
Specially Appointed Prof. Norio Miyaura received the 2010 MEXT Commendation for Science and Technology Prize in recognition of his research on catalyzed carbon-carbon bond formation using arylboronic acids. The award ceremony was held in Tokyo at the Shinjuku Keio Plaza Hotel on April 13. A cross-coupling reaction using organoboronic acids reported by Prof. Miyaura and colleagues in 1979 is recognized worldwide as the Suzuki-Miyaura coupling, and is applied extensively in the field of organic synthesis. The most widely utilized coupling reactions involve arylboronic acids or their ester derivatives. There are over 6,000 (Scifinder, 2008) scholarly papers and patents related to biaryl compound synthesis. Though boronic acids are generally stable and easy to handle, it did not previously draw much attention because of its low utility value due to chemical inactivity and its lack of significant biological activity. However, manufacturing with a significant reduction of the risk that metallic elements pose was made possible by using boron - a nonmetallic element. Its continued use is expected not only in aromatic compounds but also in various metal-catalyzed reactions. In 2002, Prof. Miyaura co-organized the Post OMCOS Symposium: Thirty Years of the Cross-Coupling Reactions with RIKEN Advanced Science Institute Director Kohei Tamao, and Prof. Tamejiro Hiyama of Kyoto University in Kyoto.
|
